


Race You to the Stars

by beanthemachine



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Marauders, OC, remus lupin - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-07-19
Updated: 2014-07-24
Packaged: 2018-02-09 12:08:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1982412
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beanthemachine/pseuds/beanthemachine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>As a prisoner, Dorcas Meadowes gets a pensieve in which she allows us to dive in to her memories of when the war first started. Romance, destructions, laughter, tears. Marauder years, of course.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Prologue: In The Cell

It has been too long since I’ve seen the sun, so dazzling and promising of a new day. The coldness in this cell seems to have consumed every ounce of my existence replacing it with a black and white shell of the fantastic colors I once held true and dear. Does that even make any sense?  
  
Perhaps it doesn’t. Perhaps I’m just crazy. Well, isn’t that the story of my life? It is, even if you don’t know it. Even I barely remember, it seems so distant I might believe it was somebody else’s life if you told me, but I do know that there was a time before this cell. I remember how the sky smelled. I remember laughing and crying and feeling despair and happiness but everything is so jumbled, like a strange puzzle scattered among the ocean and drifting away from each other.  
Every night they have tortured me in this crude cell until I have forgotten my own name. It’s almost always the same questions, every once in a while a different one will be asked.  
All of the questions have one thing in common: I don’t know the answer.  
  
The people they ask about, the secrets they want me to spill, the knowledge they hope to capture; all of it is nothing but a bunch of strange syllables and sounds. It’s agonizing not knowing anything anymore.  
  
Something deep inside me tells me that even if I had the knowledge of the stupid and pointless things they ask, I also have the wisdom not to answer them, for they are the venom in everything beautiful and the black hole among the bright stars that I have not laid eyes upon for quite some time.  
  
But the strangest thing is happening right now; there are shrill and bone-chilling screams that most definitely are not my own and a lot of shuffling above my prison ceiling. The screams are foreign to me; it has been so long since I’ve heard screams that weren’t ripping through my throat, making it raw and swollen and weakening with each note; a crescendo if you will, that never seems to stop. Though I know at least some of the screams I hear are coming from my tortures’ vile and evil mouths, I cannot bear to listen. Even as my hatred seeps from every sweat-soaked pore, I get no satisfaction from their screams, though they sure get pleasure from mine. I don’t understand how they can enjoy such a sound. What strange beings Death Eaters are.  
  
The door is creaking open and pale hands deliver a bowl filled with strange swirly liquid with a note attached to it. The fingernails are jagged and slightly yellow tinged and the skin is kind of pulled over the bones. I cannot help but feel those hands are somehow familiar. Not necessarily a good familiar or even bad, just…familiar. Crazy? You would be too.  
  
“This is a penseive, if you can’t remember the name of it. In its depths you may place your memories inside. Do you remember anything? You know not your name but perhaps you’d be able to remember if you tried. It will be a while before you are found. There has been an intrusion and the Order of the Phoenix has invaded. They will not find you, however. You will soon die. I thought you’d prefer to die knowing your cause and who you are. Good luck, Dorcas Meadowes”  
  
Dorcas Meadowes. That’s…..me. I remember my name. How strange. But who’s the Order of the Phoenix. It reminds me of a pizza delivery place. Pizza………god it’s been so long since I’ve had it, or decent food at all. Eating it with…..I don’t remember. I had friends though, I am sure of it. And we ate pizza with all the grease and cheese and pepperoni and vegetables. And there was that time that I argued about pineapples with…someone.  
  
A face comes to mind. Gray eyes and a nice chin with black hair down a little past the ears……bad puns…..pad buns……..Pad……Oh god, it’s right there at the tip of my tongue….  
And a wolf. Something about a rabbit and fur. A joke turned serious.  
  
Sirius Black, padfoot, pineapples. And Remus Lupin, a werewolf and my love.  
  
The Order of the Phoenix is not a pizza delivery place. Far from it. Ridiculously far.  
  
James, Peter, Gideon and Fabian, Lily, Marlene.  
  
How could I forget? How do I remember? I feel seriously fucked in the head.  
  
The Order of the Phoenix was an oath that one would see through to death for a better world. I was a part of it, and my friends were too.  
  
I do not know if I should be overjoyed that I have regained my memory, or terrified. They will find me, one way or another. The Death Eaters I mean. When they do, I will not see another day.

  


Of this, I am strangely (and calmly) sure.

  


Now, if you would be so kind as to journey with me into this penseive to the depths of my slightly deranged mind, my story shall unravel. Quickly now, I fear don’t have much time.


	2. Halloween

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A drunken Halloween, and introduction of characters.

I think it would only make sense to begin our story on a rather life-changing day. Yes, I said “our” for, though it is my memory, this side of the story will show the changes throughout my friends, and maybe even some enemies, for the war affected everybody. What you are about to witness is the inevitable transition from being care-free teenagers to wary young adults…

 

The smell of the light autumn breeze wafted in through the open window with the thin curtains slightly parted in the middle, the garish light of dawn complementing the crisp smell of the morning dew. I was the first one up, as usual, and was in a particularly delightful mood despite it being a Monday.

Today was Halloween, my favorite holiday. Admittedly, Hogwarts did disappointingly little in the way of Halloween. Of course there was a great feast every year and the ghosts did awesome enactments of whatever they felt like doing that year, but no dressing up was allowed. Well, people got _dressed_ obviously, but no awesome costumes or anything. Being brought up a muggle, this disappointed me. It was understandable though, after the magical world did contain some of the myths muggles tended to dress up as. Such as vampires, werewolves and, hell, I’m sure I saw a siren once in a small Egyptian magic village. 

And let’s not forget the obvious, witches and wizards.

I stretched my lanky arms and bounded off my bed, eager to start the new (and spooooooooky) day. I ripped the curtains open wide only to receive curses and life-threatening threats from my fellow Gryffindors (who enjoyed sleeping too much in my opinion) and a couple of pillows lazily flung my way, every one of them missing me.

I bounced on Viper Besic’s bed, a dark skinned girl with honey brown eyes. “Good morning!” I sang happily, amused by the angry expression on the poor lass’s face. “I’m going to go get some delicious food!” Viper growled in return and rolled back over. I glanced at the other girls and realized that they, too, went back to sleep. Expecting this reaction, I simply went to the Great Hall by myself.

The girls in Gryffindor were great, really, but we were never the closest friends. We all got along, with the exception of Rose Embers (who was quite the snob) and would sometimes stay up late coming up with weird ideas but never went out of our ways to spend time with each other. Or at least, that’s how it is with me and them. I didn’t mind, actually. I had some friends in Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff and usually spent my time with some of them. Most of the Slytherins kept to themselves, though you would meet the odd social Slytherin.

Glancing around the Great Hall, I spotted Lily Evans, one of my Gryffindor friends, already eating an early breakfast and joined her. She seemed to be eyeing a group further down the ridiculously long table, which consisted of four guys. Some people might think she was looking that way because she was absolutely smitten with a certain raven-haired bespectacled young man or her Head Girl senses were sensing chaos and mischief.

Anyone who knew her well would realize it was a bit of both. She was, indeed, infatuated with James Potter even if it took her a while to figure out. I was always very amused by the bickering of the two of them, usually started by James making a cheeky comment (thankfully, the whole trying to get Lily to go on a date with him ended last year (his genitalia were on the line, or wand point if one wants to be specific)) and Lily throwing a tantrum, bless her redhead trait.

“That lot is up to something,” she muttered looking at her food and prodding it with her spoon.

The four guys were looking quite suspicious with two on each side of the table and their head put together as close as possible and butts off the bench. Really, one would think they were about to start a guy on guy orgy in the middle of their breakfast.

“Actually, that wouldn’t be so bad,” I muttered to myself.

Lily blinked at me, confusion swirling all around in her eyes. Not literally of course, metaphorically. “What wouldn’t be so bad?”

“Oh…” I trailed off, trying to think of an excuse to what I just accidently said. “You really don’t want to know what’s floating in my mind.” I went with the vague truth, unable to think of something else to say. It was true; she probably didn’t want to know what I just thought. I was protecting her virtue, damn it!

Really though, the Marauders weren’t at all too shabby. I’d describe them to you, but since they’re so infamous, you’ve probably heard of them before.

“What do you think their plotting this year?” Lily asked, returning the topic to the plotting boys.

I rolled my eyes at her. “It’s Halloween, let ‘em have at it.”

She poked angrily at her hash browns, “I bet it has something to do with the Slytherins…”

“And the Slytherins generally have it coming to them,” I said, glaring at a third year Slytherin who just threw pineapple at my back as if on cue. “Oy, watch ya’self!” I shouted across the Hall as the third year’s eyes grew thrice his original size.

Snickering, I returned to my own breakfast as the Marauders slithered over to where we were happily feasting upon dead flesh. Lily made a weird noise of disgust in her throat as James sat next to her with a grin on his face. Sirius sat on her other side and tried to steal a piece of toast from Lily’s plate, who whacked him with her spoon.

Remus sat on my left and Peter took my right. Remus gave me a sideways smile as we exchanged pleasantries.

“So,” I whispered to him, “James trying to woo Lily?”

He chuckled, “More like trying to make civil conversation with her, without getting things thrown at him.”

“Brave of him, attempting so in the Great Hall…” I glanced around the table, spotting a pie cutter. Looking at Lily I made sure she was distracted before snatching it and placing it safely on the floor before she decided to wield it as a weapon on James Potter…again.

After a while of small talk, I frowned in concern, “Are you feeling well, Remus?”  
Remus had a habit of becoming sick at the weirdest times. I figured it had something to do with genetics, for it seemed that almost every month he was visiting a sick relative. It was passing strange, since I’ve never heard him talk about family other than them being sick. He was looking rather pale this time and had bags under his eyes like he hadn’t been sleeping well.

“I’ve just got a bit of a cold. It’ll probably clear up soon.”

I put my hand on his forehead, “Perhaps…you feel a bit on the clammy side. You should probably eat a jalapeno to keep warm.”

“Did someone say clammy?” Sirius dangled a clam in front of my face, making it wriggle. I grabbed it from him and gently slapped his face with it a couple of times.

“Ha ha ha, pun boy,” I said sarcastically as he scowled while cradling his beloved cheek.

“No need to get snippy,” he complained, putting the clam back on his plate.” I gave him a judgmental look before tending to my breakfast.

“Wow,” Peter mumbled. “It’s been over five minutes and Lily hasn’t tried to do James in yet.” The four of us pondered the amazement of it for a moment.

“Miss Meadowes!” Professor Slughorn snapped at me. “If you don’t like my class, the door is open.” Potions class was a rather tedious subject to me and often bored me to sleepiness. It was understandable that Slughorn would get irritated with students falling asleep in his class if we were brewing, but today we were just getting lectured about….something or other.  
“Night, Captain!” I saluted the class as I slung my bag over my shoulder and slinked out of the classroom, heading towards my common room.

Halfway on my humble path to a nice, leisurely nap (it was double Potions and right after that, it was lunch) a rather raspy and demanding voice intruded my comforting thoughts of a nice sofa with pillows and fluffy blankets.

“Filthy Mudblood!”

I sighed and glared at the Slytherin. “At least I don’t have a filthy vag-”

Bethany Cross’s face turned several shades of purple, her anger looking quite ugly. Bethany had quite the reputation that was just as ugly as her face. She was a female built almost like a fridge and a wee little moustache was forming on her upper lip. She was mostly known for hexing anyone who merely glanced at her and physically beating Quidditch players on the opposing team with her bat. Pureblood maniac to the core, that was good old Beth. Most definitely not the best person to bump into in the corridor. Of course, I have the best luck in the world. Before I could finish the sentence, right when she pulled out her wand, another voice intruded. 

“Five points from Slytherin for trying to duel in the hallways.” It was almost authoritive sounding, but there was humor in it. Behind me was Remus Lupin who looked extremely amused but at the same time slightly tense, like a he was about to jump in the middle if need be.

“You don’t have the authority to do that!” Beth sputtered.

“Oh really?” Remus straightened up from his casual, slightly slouchy stance making them eye level. The seemed to have a glare-off before Remus stated, “Nice moustache.” 

Right before she did a Bat-Bogey Hex, Remus casually muttered the disarming spell and then sent her wand all the way down the corridor. Remus grabbed my wrist and pulled me away from Beth’s right hook and we ran, laughing all the while. That left Beth with two options: fight two Gryffindors who were both armed, or go get her wand before someone tampered with it. She went with the obvious choice and sprinted the other way, toward her wand. 

We ended up running up three floors before collapsing on the floor, slightly out of breath from both from running up all those stairs and laughing ridiculously loud.

“That,” I managed to sputter while clutching my stomach, still laughing “was pure genius!”

Remus looked slyly at me, his eyes glinting with mischief, “If you think that’s genius, wait until tonight.”

“I better not be disappointed.”

Turns out, I most definitely was not disappointed.

For all the chaos they manage to inflict upon the school, the Marauders were very bright (if even if at least half of them didn’t pay attention in class) students. Some of the spells they tended to prank people with rather difficult spells that I thought even some of the teachers were unable to cast. In their third year, they made a polyjuice potion and Sirius had a piece of Dumbledore’s hair that was on Dumbledore’s desk that Sirius had snagged while Dumbledore was on a piss break from watching Sirius in his “detention.” The only thing that gave them away was Sirius turning into Dumbledore right as Dumbledore turned the corner a week later, heading toward McGonagall’s office. They never did reveal their whole “Turn into Dumbledore” plot to anyone, and I prodded them about it for ages afterwards. They were never ones to tell their prank mechanics, most unfortunately.

Their final Halloween prank was a rather enthralling one, what with them wanting to make their last Halloween at Hogwarts a memorable one. They started off with simple charm work, making the floating candles all harmonize in creepy Halloween opera voices singing a silly old tune I scarce remembered after.  
 _“With the werewolves howling and panthers prowling, we bring to you this night a goody bag full of fright”_ were the two lines sung before dungbombs appeared on the Slytherin table in place of the plates. As the dungbombs went off, a rainbow of colors started filling the Great Hall. Everyone was covering their nose and mouths in attempt to prevent, in vain, the smell from invading their nostrils.

It was the strangest thing, upon exiting the Great Hall with the rest of the crowd. Before managing to slip away to the Gryffindor Tower, Remus grabbed my wrist and pulled me to the side and put his finger to his lips. He cocked his head toward the door and I saw the Slytherins exiting too, more than a little distinctive. Their skin was different colored, some green, some red, and different colors of the rainbow.

“How-??” I begun to ask him but we were running once again, this time toward the Tower and away from McGonagall, who was probably trying to spot the Marauders for questioning.

We met the rest of the Marauders, who had acquired firewhiskey and elven-made mead, in the Tower.

“Might I interest you in toxic fluids?” Remus asked, bowing as he offered me the alcohol. 

I took it and opened it, “My favorite kind of fluids, good sir,” I said, before realizing how it could be interpreted. “Don’t even.” Remus shook his head before we downed a couple of shots.

We were all trashed within the hour. Remus and I were attempting leap frog and very failing miserable while James, Sirius and Peter were playing a game called Fool’s Hair, a game they made up quite a while ago. One person was the “fool” and the other two people would magic hair on the blindfolded “fool” and that person had to guess where they put the hair on their body.

“Liiiiiiillllllllllyyyyy!” I called out after tripping over Remus for the thousandth time and running toward her.

“Hello,” Lily said, her eyes sparkling with amusement.

“I saved ya botter,” I stumbled over my words, offering her a bottle. She just rolled her eyes at me and retreated. I’d only managed to get her drunk once. It was fun! That night was not a drunken Lily night apparently.

“Remmar!” I pouted to Remus, “Lily won’t take! Won’t take!”

“We’ll get her next time!!” He raised his fist in the general direction of Lily. My fist joined his and we drunkenly fell down to the floor with a great THUMP.

James and Sirius helped us up, finished with their game (Peter lost, revealing his nether regions to part of the common room claiming that they clearly put the hair… _there_ , forgetting he had…well, you know). They had more tolerance than me and Remus had.

“Thank you, good chalk,” I spluttered to Sirius, giving Remus a high-five and stumbling some more. “I think I won leap frog!”

“No you didn’t,” Remus swayed, pointing at me, “you fell on me more than I did you!”

In the middle of our disagreement an owl had brought a letter, addressed to Lily, who ran out of the common room after reading it. The only who noticed was James.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The first chapter. I'm still kinda learning the ropes of the site, too.  
> I'd love to hear what you have to say on this chapter. Critique?

**Author's Note:**

> This was written before the last two books came out. I have decided to pick it back up. Which means I have some chapters already made and it will give me time to continue it. What do you guys think?


End file.
